Loving Angels
by 88Ivories
Summary: A story of Gabriel leaving Heaven. It's not always easy to leave your family behind, but Angel's aren't the only beings who can answer prayers. Same OFC from my other stories, but can stand alone.
1. I Sit and Wait

**~ 40 A.D.**

The Goddess was drawn to her water, now known as the Shannon Pot, but then only known as the Well of Knowledge. Someone was there. Someone with a terrible sadness, more so than any she'd ever felt. She couldn't quite get a clear picture, but the emotion was so overwhelming that she knew she had to go.

She saw him. A man, sitting alongside the water, arms crossed over his knees pulled up to him, looking across the water, crying.

She was cautious. She hadn't noticed this man climbing to the Well. She rarely misses those in travel. She was unable to read his mind. This type of blocking was not unknown to her, but not common. She watched for a moment, but she couldn't allow this person to be alone in this sorrow when they are clearly looking for answers. That's why people sought out the well, looking for answers and solutions to their problems.

She took up the guise of a middle-aged woman and approached noisily. The man noticed and tried to calm himself. She sat next to him.

"Why, good sir, are you so sad?" She requested.

"My sorrows are of nobody's concern." He laughed. "And you couldn't possibly understand."

"I can understand more than you imagine. You've come to the Well of Knowledge. Those who come here look for answers, they look for me." She began to glow with a shimmer of green and turquiose, and allowed her true form to shine through her material exterior.

The man turned to look at her. "All I seek is peace and quiet and beauty. I don't require knowledge. I have more than enough." He looked directly at the woman-Goddess, and allowed his true form to slip through. The trained senses of the Goddess saw the flash of wings and unmistakable glimmer of Heaven in his eyes. "You don't want to talk with me." He turned away again.

She had been right to be cautious. This was an Archangel. Her kind did not deal with angels. They were interferences in human society, and lately, with the whole Jesus issue, many of her superiors were extremely unhappy with Heaven's persistent need to control humans.

However, she could not ignore the sadness she felt. Angel or not, he came to find something, and she would do what she could to help him.

"You are wrong. I do want to talk to you. You feel a pain so great that it drew me here from far away. No one, human or Angel, should bear a pain like that alone. I will stay."

The man nodded, he had already resumed his tearful demeanor and was in no position to fight this Goddess at this moment. She settled herself with her legs crossed. She gazed out across her pond and put her hand on his upper back and rubbed gently.

The Angel felt the aura of positive energy that she emitted and her unwavering commitment to his well-being, something he hadn't felt in nearly a millennium. This touch invoked deeper feelings in the Angel and he soon began sobbing into his still crossed arms. She reached around to encompass his shoulders with her arm and pulled him slightly toward her. He leaned on her without resistance and sobbed into the night. She remained steadfast and did not leave his side.

As the sun began to rise over Shannon's Pot, the two sat side by side, still. The Angel, still sad, but resolved to move forward, and the Goddess, knowing she may be ridiculed, but at this moment caring nothing about that, only about the one beside her.

After the sun rose, the Angel turned to the Goddess. "You've been with me all night, and yet I never told you my name nor have I learned yours."

"I am Ceibhfhionn." She smiled at him.

"Ceibhfhionn. That is beautiful. I am Gabriel."

"Gabriel. I am glad you came to my Well, Gabriel. I must go now, my people are calling for me."

"Will I meet you again?"

"If you stand by the Well and call for me, I will always hear. I believe I will see you again." The Goddess vanished, leaving the Angel still in wonderment at her unexpected aid, and possibly, slightly in love with this Goddess.


	2. Contemplate My Fate

**40-100 A.D.**

The Goddess and the Archangel had a long courtship. When you've been alive for thousands and millions of years, sixty seems like nothing. The Goddess had her duties to attend to. She had people to watch over plus the Well of Knowledge, which had visitors often enough. She moved throughout Ireland, Briton, Scotland, and Wales among the native people giving inspiration, wisdom, and helping people find their right path.

The Angel spent a good deal of time alone with the world. He visited the extremes of the Earth, the highest mountains, lowest valleys, coldest and hottest. The only thing he didn't want was people, except for his Goddess. Oftentimes, he would find something beautiful in a rainforest or a mountain top, and he would return to the Well. He would call for the Goddess, and she would come, though not always right away. They would explore this new beauty together. Sometimes the great sadness that brought the Angel to Earth would overtake him, and he would sit by the shores of the Shannon Pot with the Goddess by his side. She never asked questions, and he never offered information. They simply shared the moments together, more than the Angel could ever have hoped for.

There were those who knew what the Goddess was doing among her kind. However, they kept to themselves. Her job was still being done, and that's all that mattered at this point.

On the top of a fjord in Norway, Gabriel declared his love for Ceibhfhionn, and she accepted, on a single condition. She needed to know what brought Gabriel down from Heaven and why he wasn't planning to return.

"I only need as much detail as you are willing to give, but I need to know." She said as he started pacing near the edge of fjord. "Love is dependent on trust, I can't trust you if you won't tell me what brought us together."

Gabriel sighed, sat again beside his beloved Goddess, and told her the story. She already knew some of this story, but from Gabriel's perspective, it was very different. This was the story of his family. Of his two brothers, one younger, one older, Lucifer and Michael. His father came to all of them, Raphael, Gabriel, and Zachariah included, and told them how proud he was of the humans. He called them his greatest creation, and asked his Angels to worship them. Lucifer, the rebel, disagreed, Michael defended their father and so began a battle. Gabriel didn't know what to think or where to go. He remembers staying out of the fray, and that his fathers last words to Lucifer were, "If you want to go, then you can just stay gone." That was just before he told Michael to throw Lucifer out, permanently.

Things were never the same after that. Lucifer's presence was clearly missed, but never discussed. In their own ways, the Archangels resented what their father had done to their brother. Michael became more and more his father's sword, and no longer wanted to have normal conversations with his brothers. Zachariah was his brother's second man, only with a sense of humor. That was nice at least, since Michael seemed to have lost his. The Angel discussed how he felt further and further from the family, rarely talking to his brothers or father.

Recently, it was noticed that he had been withdrawn, and his father gave him a job, a special job, to prepare the world for the first human-born son of God. It seemed wonderful at the time, he was doing good for his family and making these women happy. Although, he never quite understood why Mary was so anxious about the whole thing. Who wouldn't want to bear the Lord's son?

It was the aftermath that no one expected. Apparently, Dad only shared his overall plan with Michael and the new son, Jesus. Now there was a "human" in Heaven, and he was apparently the new favorite? The brothers were arguing more and more, and Michael, who used to be close to Gabriel before the Lucifer incident, became more and more distant. Father spent all his time with the new son, and no one was watching what was happening on Earth in the wake of Jesus's rise to Heaven. Father's response, echoed through Michael, and by extension Zach, was "they are smart, let them deal with it."

Gabriel had no one to talk to. He didn't feel like he could voice an opposing opinion, or he would possibly end up with Lucifer. His brothers were no fun anymore. He could hang out with the Garrison, but they resented his Archangel status. They never spoke to God, he did, although it didn't seem like a privilege right now.

So Gabriel left. He left his home and his family. He found his vessel in Ireland, and through him heard the stories of the beauty of the Well of Knowledge, but that it was a difficult climb and few survived. He figured it would be a quiet place to mourn the loss of his family and his life. Instead, he found her, his Goddess. She was the first being to care about his feelings in nearly a thousand years, and he wanted to be with her for the next thousand.

At the end of Gabriel's difficult story, Ceibhfhionn kissed him, wiped away his tears, and told him that she too loved him, and would choose to have him by her side as long as he wanted to be there.


	3. Do They Know The Places Where We Go

**100-400 A.D.**

Love can truly transcend all things.

The Angel and the Goddess took this both literally and figuratively.

They brought their love to places that the human body cannot stand and reached passions that human minds would be blown away by.

They shared the view of the top of the Great Pyramid of Giza, the Lighthouse of Alexandria, and Niagara Falls, although they weren't there for the views.

They experienced new ways of thinking and understanding with each other. Each was used to being able to read minds, to understand easily, but they couldn't do this to each other. Everything was new, unexpected, surprising.

Love can transcend, but it is not perfect.

Gabriel's past was still a problem. He was intensely angry at his brothers and father for the situation that led to him leaving, but he was also deeply in pain that it happened. He missed his family more than anything, they were all he had ever known before. For a long time, he avoided interacting with humans. They had caused this whole problem; why should he have anything to do with them?

However, Ceibhfhionn was intrinsically linked to humans. She had taken her place and her name from them and had vowed to help many who asked for it. If she was capable of improving the lives of these people, she wanted to try. She liked their ways. They cared for each other and worked together. If she could give the crops rain when needed or make clear the location of iron ore, then she did. She even appeared and spoke with members of the nearby villages and gave advice to leaders in their dreams.

Love can transcend, although it cannot always heal.

Gabriel did not always want Ceibhfhionn to help the humans in her lands. He wanted her to care more about the gardens of the Well of Knowledge and to help him find new lands and adventures in such places as where animals lived in the treetops which created a whole canopy of a new world above the ground.

He sometimes would go to visit the humans living in Jerusalem. He rarely returned from those trips happy. He would get angry at the way things were going and how they were acting. He worried about persecution on all sides and would often be angered at the followers of Paul and their hypocrisy. Ceibhfhionn would try to talk to him. To convince him that humans were truly good, but he was immovable. Soon, Ceibhfhionn gave up trying to change his mind. She would sit with him quietly and listen to him rant sometimes, but more often just left him be at those times.

The Goddess was often at a loss for what to do. With humans, she could see into most of their thoughts and understand what they need and how to help them. With the Angel, she could only surmise his emotions and their deeper strings, and it seemed that she was often wrong. She worried about her love. He worried about the world. Neither problem seemed easy to fix.

Love continued to transcend.

Soon, they fell into the habits that any couple falls into. When Ceibhfhionn was visiting her people, Gabriel found his own ways to deal with his anger. He liked to play tricks on the people who bothered him. He especially made trouble with the Corinthians, acting as a visiting apostle. He was especially amused when Paul wrote them a second letter, and then a third. Playing tricks on Paul only lasted so long, and he quickly moved on to the Romans.

The Angel kept this secret from his Goddess, as he knew that she would disapprove, and she had her own worries. Word of these wondrous apostles and the miracles of the man from Nazareth were beginning to reach her village, and the people did not know what to make of it.

There were still wonderful times high in the mountains or on an uninhabited Pacific Island, but a distance was growing between the Angel and the Goddess, and neither of them wanted to see it.

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**A/N: Sorry this took me so long to update. I really want to get the timeline and history right, and next up is the arrival of St. Patrick and Christianity to Ireland, so I'm hoping to get that chapter out more quickly. Thanks for reading and alerting!**


	4. A One Way Street

**445 A.D.**

Gabriel's exploits were becoming more frequent and Ceibhfhionn was beginning to hear about them.

At first it was just whispers and rumors, and mostly from Selkie who are known to be untrustworthy chit-chats. She couldn't even have been sure it was her Gabriel they were talking about. True, Loki preferred the cold winds of the north, but he had been known to travel on occasion, and these stories were right up his alley. The gossip always included one consistent fact whoever this was, it was a newcomer and someone not subject to the collective consciousness of nature spirits.

It could also have been a demon. There had been a few more of those poking around recently than Ceibhfhionn and her kind liked. However, demons couldn't actually pull off the things in these rumors, assuming they were true. Ceibhfhion's other hint was that many of the victims appeared to be these new Christians and Catholics.

There was the rich man who converted to the new religion and pledged 10% of his wealth to the church. He was later found drunk in a den of prostitutes. The next day, 10% of everything he owned was missing, literally. Furniture was missing chunks off the ends, his clothes were suddenly full of holes, and a wall of his home was missing. The pieces were found in the church courtyard.

Another that caught her attention was a Priest who was well known for preaching loudly and at everyone he met about how they should live their lives, give to the church, give up hard drink and women. Apparently, he had been drinking the sacramental wine in the evenings to unwind. One day when he got up to preach, after beginning his diatribe on his congregation, he suddenly started hearing voices telling him that he was a liar. After he started telling the people that not only was he being spoken to, but that it was the images of Jesus speaking, the other clergy of his church decided that it was better to lock him away in his room. He continued to hear the voice of Jesus every time he saw a crucifix and now babbled incoherently while the others cared for him.

Ceibhfhionn had to admit, though, that she was wary of this religious movement. It was the first time that people were not given the choice. The Catholics converted, and those who did not convert were chastised and sometimes injured by the many new converts. She had been silently watching St. Patrick cross her beautiful island. His followers were nearing her village. The Goddess had many worries, and her Angel was only one of them.

He came to her at the Well one day.

"My darling, Ceibhfhionn, you are looking beautiful today."

She turned to him and sighed. "Why Gabriel?"

He played dumb and looked confused. "Why what, my dear?"

"Why must you hurt people."

The Angel's eyes shifted downward away from the Goddess's gaze. "I don't hurt them. I just make them see the error of their ways." He looked up again staring into the Goddess's worried eyes. "It's what these people deserve. They were given free will, and they squander it with greed, and lust, and gluttony."

The Goddess sighed again and put her hand to the Angel's cheek. "But you, my dear, are responding with wrath. Is that not equally as bad?"

The Angel put his hand to hers and a great sadness came into his eyes. "In my experiences, kind words have little effect."

"In my experiences, they are the only thing that does."

The Goddess dropped her hand again. They stood in silence for a moment.

Gabriel suddenly smiled and took Ceibhfhionn's hands in his. "Come away with me. Leave these people for a while, they can handle themselves."

Ceibhfhionn tried to smile. "I can't leave them. They need me now more than ever."

Gabriel pleaded. "For a short time then, but let's go to a far island, away from these fools and their vices."

Ceibhfhionn stood in thought for a moment. There was still hope within the Angel, she felt it. Perhaps she could still turn him around.

"Okay. For a short while." She leaned in to kiss Gabriel, and the two vanished.

On the island, they laughed, talked, and made love. Gabriel seemed happier than Ceibhfhionn had seen him in a hundred years. They lay together savoring the Earth's beauty.

After a day, they were discovering a series of waterfalls when the Goddess stopped suddenly. The Angel looked at her concerned.

"My darling?"

"My people ..." She stammered. "I must return. I knew I shouldn't have left." She looked into the Angel's confused eyes. "I'm sorry." She whispered, and was gone.

She returned to fire. The flames were high and far and had nearly wiped out the village by the time the Goddess arrived. She worked quickly and the clouds soon darkened and the patter of rain rushed down to bring relief from the heat. It was too late for many though, and there was barely a home still standing.

She materialized on a hilltop overlooking her smoking village, too many villagers on their knees in the center proclaiming their belief in God and Jesus to the missionaries with torches and cursing Ceibhfhionn's name.

Gabriel appeared behind her and put his hands on her shoulders. "I'm sorry ..." He began. She shook him off and turned to him, her eyes full of anger.

"You didn't care about these people. You just wanted me to yourself. You allowed death and destruction and more people to turn to your jealous God for what? For your own distraction? You are no better than these _mere_ humans that you hate so much."

The Goddess regretted those words. She was angry. It had been over a millennium since she had allowed anger to get the better of her logic. She had already hurt the Angel though. She could see the pain in his eyes. He stepped back and vanished.

"Gabriel. I'm sorry." The Goddess shouted to the wind.

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**A/N: Still more to come, though not too much more left, drop me a hello, easy little button right down there, please! Thanks for reading!  
**


	5. When Love Is Dead

**446 AD**

The Angel had not come back.

The Goddess couldn't understand why it didn't get better. It simply hurt her more every day, and she grew more and more angry. When she did leave her water, she spied on her village and others nearby. The Catholics just kept coming and coming. They built elaborate churches that were funded with money "donated" from the villagers who wished to attend them. She was dismayed at how easily the people of this island who were once strong in their beliefs fell into line and obeyed.

Finally, she couldn't take it any longer. She had to do something, she had to fight back. The final straw fell at a nearby village. She arrived at the village in time to witness a stoning. She couldn't believe what she was hearing in the thoughts of the crowd. "Cleansing" "Sinner" "She deserved it" and worse. It was the victim though that made the biggest impression. Her thoughts were so clear, her mind so innocent. She had clearly not done anything wrong, and yet, the Priests stated otherwise, so that's what was believed.

"This has to stop!" The Goddess looked toward the sky and gathered the clouds together and soon the rain poured down upon the people until they could no longer see well enough to finish the job.

Apparently, that wasn't enough for the head Priest, he grabbed the women and delivered a finishing blow through the blinding rain.

The Goddess was enraged. "This new religion loves their water and their baptism, fine. Let them live in it." She bid the clouds to continue, and it rained, and rained, and rained.

For three days, it rained. The rivers overflowed. The fields flooded. The houses flooded. People prayed to God, but it didn't stop. The priests told the people that they were sinners and they were being punished. The people prayed and fasted. Still, the rain continued.

Then, a voice reached the Goddess. "Please, to the spirits of the rain, I have lost one child to the floods. I don't want to lose another. Please, make the rains stop."

The Goddess stopped the rains.

"What have I done?"

She had been so lost in her anger that she didn't see the effects. Now, she could see those she had hurt, those who had died. How could she have done that?

The Goddess retreated to her waters in tears, alone.

She didn't stay alone for long. Soon she felt a strong arm around her shoulders.

"Don't cry, my love." the Angel's voice whispered in her eye.

"I lost control. I allowed people to die. I'm no better than that which I fought against."

"They deserved it. These people, blindly following. Why don't they stand up for themselves? You shouldn't feel guilty. You just did what anyone would."

The Goddess was shocked at the Angel's words. She knew that he still felt anger towards these Catholics, too, but to consider what happened okay? Deserved? No. That was wrong. She pulled away from the Angel, wiping her tears away.

"No one deserves to die."

Now, the Angel appeared surprised. "I thought you would be on my side now, see why I do what I do."

The Goddess shook her head sadly at her Angel. "You truly don't understand. You can't change. I'm sorry."

The Angel cocked his head, puzzled. "Sorry?"

The Goddess reached out and took his hands. "We can't be together. Not like this."

"But ..."

"I want to spend my days helping those who face difficult decisions and challenges. You want to teach them lessons in a different way. I couldn't do it. I love you, but I couldn't be around you knowing what you do."

Now, the Angel's eyes filled with tears as he stood up and back away.

"You're wrong. You can't mean that."

The Goddess stood and faced her Angel one more time.

"I do."

The Goddess did not miss the expression of pain on the Angel's face, and then, he was gone.

She knew it was the right choice. Now, she knew what she had to do. There were people who needed help. She looked around her waters one more time. She knew that she wouldn't be back for a while.


End file.
